The Bombay High Court on Sunday dismissed a public interest litigation challenging a Maharashtra government notification that designated January 22 as a public holiday to mark the consecration of the Ram temple in Ayodhya, Live Law reported.

A division bench of Justices GS Kulkarni and Neela Gokhale, which heard the case during a special sitting, said that declaring holidays lies within the realm of the government. The judges described the petition as “absolutely frivolous” and said that it was a “publicity interest litigation”, according to Bar and Bench.

The petition was filed by law students Shivangi Agarwal, Satyajeet Salve, Vedant Agrawal and Khushi Bangia. They contended that declaring a public holiday for a religious event contradicted the principle of secularism enshrined in the Constitution. The petitioners also argued that the power to declare public holidays lies with the Centre, and not state governments.

However, Advocate General Birendra Saraf, representing the Maharashtra government, argued that allowing citizens to follow their religious beliefs could not be termed as a violation of the principle of secularism. He also said that declaring a holiday is a matter of policy, and that courts should not interfere with it.

The court said that the petitioners failed to make out a case that declaring the holiday was an arbitrary exercise of power. The judges also criticised the petitioners for questioning the rationale of the Supreme Court judgement that paved the way for the temple in Ayodhya to be constructed.

“Our judicial conscience is shocked when we see such statements on Supreme Court,” the court said, according to Bar and Bench.

The bench refrained from imposing costs on the petitioners but said it hoped that they would be “more careful when appearing in person”.

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